Stow Aways: Halloween Festivities 2011

I'm starting to feel like Halloween season is as much work as Christmas. It seems like there are as many activities anyway... AND you have to go in costume. We celebrated the heck out of fall. Here is the photo tour:

Kindergarten Pumpkin Patch Field trip, complete with crazy corn maze:

cool green lady bug we found in the pumpkins:

hay wagon ride:

Costume party numero uno: Daddy's boss at work hosted a party at our very own Galloping Grace pumpkin patch! This year, the chosen costumes were an Ice Dragon Ninja and a Fancy Witch.

always fun to see our sweet friends, Maren and Christian (they were there too since the daddies work together and all.)

next up: getting ready for trunk-or-treat at the church:

Lots of people have heard my costume story... A few weeks back, I saw this awesome Marge Simpson costume, complete with wig on clearance for 15 bucks. I should have grabbed it instantly, but was feeling cheap that day and didn't want to spend money on a costume for myself. Fast forward a couple of weeks and I realize that I've got a half dozen places where I need to dress up so I head back to see if it is still there. Not. I can't get over it, so I decide if I can make the costume for $10 or less, I'll do it. I made the dress and necklace for like $8 and bought some hair spray. I've got plenty of hair - I can make my own beehive and spray it blue. I think it's going to be fabulous. I hate it when I'm wrong about things like that. It was a total flop. It turned out to be cold, so I couldn't wear the skin colored shade shirt under the dress and had to wear long sleeve black with black leggings. So, that ruined it right there. Then, I spent more than 2 hours getting a beehive in my hair only to find out that my "blue" hair paint looked green when sprayed on and made my hair too heavy and flattened the beehive. BOO. Bottom line - if you have to explain your costume, you don't have a good costume. It didn't help that Homer has a full head of hair, a goatee hanging from his chin, and took his stuffing out of his shirt right after this picture.

These folks are much cuter.

Then, off to costume dinner party the next night. Harriet decided to wear several costumes over the weekend since she has a closet full of fun things. She did Snow White on Saturday night. (why don't I have pictures of Saturday night? She looked so darling in the Snow White.)

Then, a pumpkin carving party on Sunday night with the Wixom bunch. Hattie opted for Tinkerbell this time. Grace stuck with her Ninja wear for everything.

David worked real hard to put on that scarecrow hat from the costume box and find his plaid shirt. I decided the kitty ears and a satin ribbon tail would increase my costume : effort ratio so I ditched Marge.

Best Woody, Jessie, and Buzz I saw this month:

The kids designed their own pumpkins. I super love Grace's yin/yang jack-o-lantern.

Is it Halloween YET?????
Oh, yes it is. Time for school parties! I have no pictures here either. There wasn't much to capture. The school banned costumes and face paint. The kids wore black and orange Halloween shirts. Harriet's class served an all orange lunch which they had to eat in about 15 minutes flat to make it to library on time. They saved my pumpkin muffins for snack the next day. Grace's class banned sweets and had a mid-afternoon snack of fruit and veggies and pretzels then pulled out some card games. I guess I should have taken pictures, but there wasn't much to see folks, and parties went by so quick (compared to how much work I did for them and how long I was at the school!)

Definitely pizza for dinner. Since... I was still at school when the last bell rang and we came home at 4pm with pumpkins still to carve. Check this out - I didn't even have to make it. Good ol' Papa Murphy's made me up something cute AND tasty.

The girls chose "luna" pumpkins from the Galloping Grace patch. They also designed these all by themselves. Grace also carved nearly her whole pumpkin. I helped her with the details on the wolf. I thought this one was SO COOL. I was so incredibly proud of her for doing such a great job. Then, I don't know if I can bear to mention what happened to it. I still haven't told her. I hope she doesn't ask about it. One of the trick-or-treaters ripped the wolf out of it and took it. Was this before or after I gave this child free candy? For RUDE!!!

Harriet's design: flower bouquets with a sun, moon and stars on the other side. (see other picture below.)

and, these guys were still hanging on, so we put them out too:

And, MY pumpkin from the GGYR patch. I thought it was only fitting to carve horses into it. Grace pointed out afterwards that it does look like a face made with horses. um sure, I planned it that way!